SouthCoast makes big offshore wind push at Statehouse

Tuesday

Sep 29, 2015 at 6:54 PMSep 29, 2015 at 6:54 PM

By Mike Lawrencemlawrence@s-t.com

BOSTON — After Gov. Charlie Baker spoke Tuesday in support of energy legislation that would boost hydroelectric and solar power in Massachusetts, state Sen. Marc Pacheco leaned forward in his raised seat and made sure the governor was thinking about offshore wind, as well.

“There’s a lot of concerns that bringing in Canadian hydro … ends up cutting out a lot of the domestic, clean energy economy that we can grow here in the Commonwealth,” said Pacheco, a Taunton Democrat who’s the Senate vice-chairman of the state’s Joint Committee on Telecommunications, Utilities and Energy.

Pacheco, referring to the governor’s support of bringing hydrologic power from Quebec to Massachusetts, encouraged Baker to stay closer to home.

“Look at what’s taking place with offshore (wind),” Pacheco said. “When we invest in a part of the clean energy economy, the jobs stay here.”

SouthCoast lawmakers and community leaders made a big push for the offshore wind industry during Tuesday’s hearing on Beacon Hill, where legislators heard testimony about numerous proposed bills that could shape the state’s future energy development.

State Rep. Patricia Haddad, a Somerset Democrat, said it’s “a distinct possibility” that aspects of some or all of the bills discussed Tuesday could be combined into an omnibus energy bill in coming months.

Baker and Matthew Beaton, the state’s secretary of energy and environmental affairs, expressed a willingness to take a larger look at offshore wind, an industry that’s perceived as vital to New Bedford and southeastern Massachusetts.

But they also expressed significant cautions, citing the state’s already high electricity costs and the affect those costs have on businesses and residents.

“We are in the top five, six, seven (states) in the nation in the cost of electricity,” Beaton said. “We have to ask ourselves, at what point is the (offshore wind) technology ready to be deployed, and on what scale … to not have that negative effect” on consumer costs?

Beaton publicly questioned earlier this year whether the state was correct to invest in New Bedford’s $113 million Marine Commerce Terminal, which was designed to service the offshore wind industry.

Supporters of offshore wind said Tuesday that the industry just needs time, and help from the state, to take off.

Pacheco recently returned from a trip to Denmark, where he and other legislators viewed the development of offshore wind there. Pacheco then attended an event on the issue earlier this week in Washington, D.C.

“(Monday), at the offshore wind conference at the White House, one of the developers … stated publicly that offshore wind, with the new technologies that are being deployed, can compete head to head with new gas plants,” Pacheco said Tuesday in Boston.

“Put that in the bill,” Baker replied. “Tell us to test the market.”

A bill by Haddad would do just that. Her “Act to Promote Energy Diversity,” House Bill 2881, would carve out a market for 2,000 megawatts of offshore wind power in the state by 2020.

“Please don’t be fooled — wind energy can and will be here by 2020,” Haddad told the committee.